(Haptonomy - Affectivity) - Praxeology as the Method of the Social Sciences - (Affective) Phenomenology of the Social World

'..Carl Menger introduced the concept of human action as the main object of inquiry of all social sciences .. a theory of the process of human interactions. Ludwig von Mises introduced a name for it – praxeology.

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..In that sense every human being who modifies reality and pursues some ends could be seen as an entrepreneur.

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..Starting from that basis comprehension the interest of the Austrian School above all is to analyze the process of competition and dynamic nature of the market. Its interest is focused on the innovative entrepreneurial acts and market risks. One of the consequences of the acquired view is that the use of mathematics and statistics in economic research is inadequate.

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"..the essential purpose of economics is to analyze how the spontaneous social order enables us to take advantage of a huge volume of practical information which is not available anywhere in a consolidated form, but rather is dispersed or diffused throughout the minds of millions of individuals." '

'..Schütz adds that “for a theory of action the subjective point of view must be retained in its fullest strength, in default of which such a theory loses its basic foundations, namely its reference to the social world of everyday life and experience.”..'

'Alfred Schütz, the outstanding developer of the phenomenological method in the social sciences, has reminded us of the importance of going back “to the ‘forgotten man’ of the social sciences, to the actor in the social world whose doing and feeling lies at the bottom of the whole system. We, then, try to understand him in that doing and feeling and the state of mind which induced him to adopt specific attitudes towards his social environment.” Schütz adds that “for a theory of action the subjective point of view must be retained in its fullest strength, in default of which such a theory loses its basic foundations, namely its reference to the social world of everyday life and experience.” Lacking such a foundation, social science is likely to replace the “world of social reality” by a fictional nonexisting world constructed by the scientific observer. Or, as Schütz puts it succinctly: “I cannot understand a social thing without reducing it to human activity which has created it, and beyond it, without referring this human activity to the motives out of which it springs.”

'..if the civilized world is to survive, people must learn more about this science of human action.'

'Many people think that economics is a matter of opinions. Economics is not a study of opinions. Economics is a science, and as a science it deals with eternal laws — laws that men are not able to change — laws that remain constant. If we want to improve our own satisfactions in life, we must improve our ability to know and use these laws of economics so as to attain more of the things we want. So, if the civilized world is to survive, people must learn more about this science of human action.

My great teacher, Ludwig Mises, called his great book Human Action. He reduces economic science to two words: men act. From these two words he builds the whole science of economics. He points out that purposes direct all conscious human actions. We are not dealing here with the functions of the body that are performed without conscious guidance. We are dealing with the attempts of men to achieve the things they seek in life. This is what we are assembled here to learn a little bit more about.

In every act throughout our whole lifetime, we are always exchanging something we have for something we prefer. We may be exchanging our time, our energy, our money, or some other scarce good for what we want, but every one of our actions is an exchange — an exchange of something we have for something we prefer. We must learn to improve our actions if we are to get more of the things that we want in life.

The things we really want in life, both material and immaterial, our ultimate goals, are not chosen with the help of economics. Our ultimate aims and goals in life we choose ourselves. They are our decisions. We get our ideas of what we want in life from our parents, from our teachers, from our priests, from our philosophers, from our own thoughts and those of others who are in a position to help us make our own decisions on what we want. But we, each of us, know what is really important to us. No other man is capable of telling us what it is that we want or prefer. No dictator, no bureaucrat is able to tell us what we want. This is something we all decide for ourselves and which we alone know.'

‘In a modern economy, in which many economic agents simultaneously perform different functions, we will use the term capitalist to denote that economic agent whose function is precisely to save; in other words, to consume less than he creates or produces and to make available to workers the resources they need to live for the duration of the production process in which they participate..’

..and historicism..' - '..[Friedrich List] was a forefather of the German historical school of economics, and considered the original European unity theorist whose ideas were the basis for the European Economic Community.' - Wikipedia, Friedrich List)